NEW YORK - Imports of antimony trioxide from China, the world's largest antimony producer, have slowed in the past two months, prompting domestic merchants to hike prices about 10 percent.
Fewer tons of imported trioxide have hit U.S. docks so far this year, merchants said, but the decline has been more noticeable in recent months as trader inventories ebb.
Merchants said they are selling imported high-tint antimony trioxide, the most commonly used grade, at 88 to 90 cents a pound, up from a start-of-the-year range of 80 to 82 cents a pound.
"Unfortunately, supplies are very tight because the Chinese have not been shipping very much material," one dealer said. "Usually, I get about 400 tons of antimony trioxide a month, but that's been cut drastically to about 100 tons a month over the past few months," he said.
Another merchant said he also has felt the pinch from tightened supplies of imports. "My inventories are just about finished, the shipments are at least two months late and soon I'll be sitting here with nothing to sell," he said.
A merchant who said his sales of imported antimony trioxide make up at least 50 percent of his business expects merchant prices to rise further unless shipments hit U.S. docks soon. The lack of shipments may be a move by China to hike antimony trioxide prices, merchants said.
"In the past two months Chinese import prices have come down because Chinese currency has been devalued against the dollar," Doug Hulse, an analyst at Wogen Industries Ltd., London, said.
"China has tried to tighten the quantity of its antimony units exported. They have reduced the amount of export licenses," Hulse said. China, which accounts for 55 percent of total world antimony sales, is trying to generate more currency, he said.
Meanwhile, U.S. antimony trioxide producers reported prices for their material are fairly steady. U.S. antimony trioxide producers said they sell high-tint material in a range of $1.05 to $1.10 a pound. The U.S. producer price for trioxide is higher than the merchants' import price because it includes costs of processing metal into trioxide and then processing trioxides to a point where they have fewer impurities than imported trioxides.
Merchant quotes for imported antimony metal during the same period also have remained mostly unchanged.
The U.S. imports all of its antimony metal and a fair amount of oxides. Nearly 62 percent of the total imports of antimony trioxides and metal comes from China, according to the U.S. Bureau of Mines.
Total imports of oxides into the United States in the first quarter of this year amounted to 2,582 metric tons, down 1,226 tons or 32 percent from the previous quarter, according to a Bureau of Mines report. Total metal imports fell to 4,265 tons in the first quarter from 4,512 tons in the fourth quarter of 1992, the bureau report said.
China shipped 870 tons of oxides and 4,044 tons of antimony metal to the United States in the first two months of the year compared with 1,540 tons of oxide shipped and 3,889 tons of metal shipped during the previous quarter,
Both merchants and producers buy imported antimony metal. Merchants said they sell 99.65 percent pure antimony metal at 73 to 75 cents a pound.
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